DELTA: ASSESSING THE UNSUNG INTANGIBLES

Joseph Duke Okeze writes that Governor Okowa is running his state well

An honest and unbiased assessment of the performance of Senator (Dr.) IfeanyiOkowa as an elected Governor must begin first and foremost by situating the assessment within the context of his development agenda and policy objectives when he assumed office as Governor of Delta State. The critical question therefore is: what did the governor set out to achieve and to what extent has he been able to achieve it? Again, the general tendency is to evaluate performance with a rather narrow focus mainly on physical infrastructure with little or no attention on the intangibles that formed the bedrock of the entire development agenda of government. While recognizing the imperatives of physical infrastructure which by their tangible nature, are self-evident and easily verifiable, what therefore, are those unsung, non-physical otherwise known as intangibles that constitute the lifeblood of development policies under the administration of Okowa in Delta State? The State under the leadership of Senator Okowa, has witnessed unprecedented but under-reported achievements in the areas of institutional reforms, human capital development, agricultural revolution, and wealth and job creation, among other things. This, in a nutshell, is the focus of this submission.

What Did the Governor set out to achieve? The ultimate goal Governor Okowa set for the state government under his leadership was thoroughly conceived and articulated with a sharp presence of mind before he assumed duty. This made it possible for him to hit the ground running. In specific terms, his goal was conceptualised as an agenda with the acronym ‘SMART’ Agenda for STRONGER DELTA, which stands for: Strategic Wealth Creation Projects (S); Meaningful Peace Building Platforms for Political & Social Stability (M); Agricultural Reforms and Accelerated Industrialization (A); Relevant Health and Educational Policies (R); and Transformed Environment through Urban Renewal (T).

In order to leave no one in doubt as to his intentions and the direction of his administration, he further concretised his vision in practical terms by emphasizing the pivotal significance of the first item on the SMART Agenda as the core of his policy thrust. In his inaugural speech in 2015, the governor specifically said: “Job creation will be the cornerstone of all our policies; it is the common thread running through our policies and programmes in education, health, agriculture, industrialization, and infrastructure development. We shall embark on projects and programmes only when we are convinced and satisfied with their job creation content.”

The point being made here is that every development initiative of government under Governor Okowa’s administration, be it infrastructure, health, education or anything else, all revolves around job and wealth creation. Ironically, this underlying trajectory is often misrepresented or under-represented, with only its peripheral complimentary programmes and projects taking centre stage in reportage and public discuss.

Now, if job and wealth creation is the cornerstone of Okowa’s development agenda, the question that arises therefrom is: Did  Governor Okowa create jobs and where and how did he do it?

This question may be answered in reverse pattern for the purpose of clarity. First, let us, as briefly as writing space would allow, look at how Governor Okowa created jobs and wealth; and thereafter also attempt to answer the question pertaining to where he did it. How did he do it? Aggregating the entire policy framework as an organic whole, it is evident that what answers the question ‘how’ is, simply put, institutional reforms. Governor Okowa was aware that without strong institutions, no society or government can create jobs or wealth for its citizens. So, the first step the administration took was to identify and strengthen existing wealth and job creating institutions and also establishing new ones to fill observed development gaps. This step, by every stretch of imagination, was a master-stroke. He put in motion the instruments leading to the enactment of enabling laws establishing institutions that would drive the job and wealth creation agenda. The key areas where these institutional reforms were initiated include, but not limited to:  Public Finance and Accountability; Public Procurement; Urban Renewal; Public-Private Partnership (PPP); Security, Law and Order; Job and Wealth Creation; Sustainable Millennium Goals (SDGs); Contributory Health Insurance with over 1,200,000 enrollees 20 per cent of the state’s population; Technical Education; Small & Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs); Human Capital Development and Entrepreneurship; Signage and Advertisement; Agro-industrialization; Industrial/Labour Relations and Staff Welfare; Trade and Investments; and e-Governance.

With regard to the question as to where in specific terms did Governor Okowa create job and wealth, it is pertinent to point out that the job creation process, as experience under this administration has shown, is such that the projects and programmes are designed to operate with ripple effect. First, what may be referred to as job clusters are created by the government through the relevant institutions; then following a cyclical calendar, the clusters create new clusters which in turn create their own clusters and more, as the cycle expands. A typical demonstration of this strategy can be found in employment programmes initiated by Governor Okowa in the Agricultural Sector, Technical Education, and Job & Wealth Creation Office, to mention but just a few.

For instance, under the Cassava Cuttings Multiplication and Distribution Programme, sensitisation, training, selection of farmers on the new improved TME419, NR 8202 and NR 8082 cassava cuttings was carried out in 2017.  A total of 119 participants were trained statewide. After the training, participants and other Cassava farmers were empowered with the improved high-yielding, disease-resistant varieties of cassava cuttings. The yield per hectare is between 25 and 35 tonnes instead of 12 and 15 tonnes. A total of 176 farmers were empowered with 10,237 cuttings across the three Senatorial Districts and 186.95 hectares of cassava farms were cultivated.

In 2020, under the Cassava Development Programme, the sum of N78 million was released for 500 Ha of farmland for 500 beneficiaries after building their capacity. Some 30,000 bundles of improved and early-maturing cassava cuttings and 1,500 bags of fertilizers were distributed to them. Also, six processors were empowered and a single digit loan given to them with an easy payback plan.

Another cassava programme anchored by the Central Bank of Nigeria for Cassava Growers Association (CGA) in collaboration with the State was carried out in year 2020. About 6,524 Ha of land was used across six communities.  The Delta State Government assisted with the sum of N14.5 million for the survey plan of the land as its collaborative effort.

Finally, another cassava programme called the CBN 5-Star Cassava Programme commenced in 2020. It is a CBN COVID-19 palliative programme in collaboration with Delta State.750 hectares of forest were cleared for programme at an execution cost of N187.5 million, the programme is still on-going.

      In 2021, the sum of N100 million was released under the Cassava Development Programme to accelerate cassava production in the State. A total of 165 farmers were selected to cultivate 330 hectares across the State. The programme is on-going and it expected to generate 1,050 direct jobs and 3,150 indirect jobs.

The same approach is replicated under the Promotion of Commercial Snail and Grasscutter Farming; Rapid Goat Multiplication Unit; Pig Multiplication and Farmers Support programme; Poultry Farmers Support Program; Aquaculture Development Programme; Accelerated Agricultural Development Scheme (AADS), which is a special project for the empowerment of youths within the ages of 18-35 years in cluster farms; Fadama III Additional Financing Project 1; Oil Palm Development Programme; and many others.

To further consolidate its institutional reform policy, and to be able to actualize the job and wealth creation which is his ultimate goal, Governor Okowa, in 2016, drew up and submitted to the State Legislature a bill for the establishment of the Delta State Public Procurement Commission, which was later repealed and replaced with the Delta State Public Procurement Law, 2020 in order to bring it at par with global public procurement standards. The primary objective here was to implement government’s public procurement reforms and to ensure transparency, fair competition, fiscal discipline and value-for-money in contract award and procurement processes in the State, without which the ultimate goal of wealth creation may be jeopardized.          

Similarly, in 2019, Governor Okowa, working in synergy with the Rt. Hon. Sheriff Francis Oborevwori-led Delta State House of Assembly, enacted the Job and Wealth Creation Law, 2019. With this legal backing, the Office became institutionalized and was therefore upgraded to the Delta State Job and Wealth Creation Bureau. The Bureau was designed to identify, train, equip and start-up unemployed youths in vocational enterprises cutting across catering and confectionery, fashion design and tailoring, tiling and interlocking, audio-visual services, and PoP-Painting and screed making, hairdressing and braiding, electrical installation and solar works, and welding and fabrication. As we speak, the Bureau presently has trained and established small and medium scale enterprises for 12, 755 entrepreneurs and has created 223,805 direct jobs and 1,325,750 indirect jobs. It is noteworthy that these thousands of Okowa-powered new entrepreneurs will themselves become employers of labour in the very near future, thereby further reducing drastically the unemployment figures in the State. Also, with the mandate of the Job and Wealth Creation Bureau to nurture new batches of entrepreneur every year, unemployment figures can only keep reducing.

In the education sub-sector, the establishment of three universities, nine technical colleges, and 14 vocational skill centres across the State also came with their respective job creation potential. Having presented a bill for the establishment of the Delta State Technical and Vocational Education Board (TVEB) followed by the creation of the Ministry of Technical Education in 2019, the technical colleges alone first recruited over 500 teaching staff, about 365 non-teaching staff; and later recruited additional 365 teaching staff and 188 non-teaching staff, not to mention the personnel engaged by the universities and vocational centres.

To what extent therefore, has Governor Okowa achieved his ultimate goal of job and wealth creation for Deltans? For the records, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBI 2021) puts the State’s reduction of unemployment rate at 31 per cent lower than all-states average of 37 per cent. With regard to economic transformation as envisioned in his SMART Agenda for STRONGER Delta, the NBI rates the non-oil sector more than 50 per cent of the State’s economy with an increase from 41.9% in 2013 to 52.50 per cent in 2020, while the services sector increased from 18.77 per cent of 2013 GDP to 29.73 per cent of 2020 GDP. Apart from Governor Okowa’s intimidating score-card in infrastructural development, particularly with regard to road construction for which he has earned public accolades and ROADMASTER nickname, his development strides some of which, though intangible in nature, would no doubt be remembered as legacies that would remain indelible in the minds of Deltans and a reference point for his successors in office and for posterity.

Dr. Okeze writes from Delta State